Teaching basic meaning of decimal as a special form of fraction

Abstract

Decimal is a special type of number that some students have a great difficulty in grasping the concept. Current trend in the teaching and learning of decimal is by converting from fraction form into decimal form without any other consideration. The process of converting is by performing standard fixed algorithm of division. The process is performed by using numerator as dividend and denominator as divisor. The quotient obtained is the decimal number. The process is procedurally correct, but the problem then is whether students can make sense of what decimal is all about. Many previous studies indicated that students, in some cases including their teachers, hardly make sense of what decimal is all about (Zulkifli & Mohini Mohamed, 2008; Reys & Yang, 1998). This research, using design research method is to address the issue on understanding the basic meaning of decimal in relation to fraction as an important part of promoting number sense.number sense, design research, pre service teachers, decimal fraction